Long Beach’s ‘Beach Streets’ Ciclovía Set to Invade DTLB on March 19

Well, the City of Long Beach will see its second ciclovía on Saturday, March 19—and yes, it will be in Downtown Long Beach for Beach Streets Downtown.

We had lamented that Downtown didn’t score a ciclovía last year when Long Beach’s first Beach Streets was held in Bixby Knolls/North Long Beach. Many, particularly our former editor Brian Addison, felt “the imagery of Downtown paired with its density, attractions, and biking/ped infrastructure, would have better served for the city’s first time in the ciclovía spotlight and led to more ciclovías from here on out with much more ease.”

The 4-mile route will stretch mainly along Broadway between Euclid in Belmont Heights to Pine in DTLB, with multiple extensions of car-free streets, including Pine Avenue from 1st to 8th Streets and Linden Avenue from 1st to 3rd Streets, both in DTLB. Other extensions include Cherry Avenue from 2nd to 4th Streets and including Bixby Park; 4th Street from Cherry Avenue to Junipero Avenue in Retro Row; and a block party at Broadway and Euclid Avenue.

Thankfully, the City has brought on the Downtown Long Beach Associates to help activate the Downtown portion of the route west of Alamitos.

“Ciclovías are truly wonderful events on two levels: reminding people of the fact that the vast majority of public space is handed to the vehicle and, just as importantly, the power of the human scale,” said Kraig Kojian, President and CEO of the DLBA. “As longtime advocates that have helped foster DTLB’s biking culture with events like Bike Fest and initiatives such as the Downtown by Bike Campaign, DLBA is both excited and honored to be a part of Beach Streets’ first outing in DTLB.”

6 Comments

Michael MacDonald says:January 12, 2016 at 12:47 pm

As a visitor to Long Beach, I thought the “Uptown” route was a spectacular showcase of communities I had not spent much time in, and also to an introduction to Beach Streets as a community-centered event in slight contrast to CicLAvia’s more festival-like events.